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Jasper the puppy, just in time for Christmas

December 18, 2013

I was going to write about guest rooms. You know: how to make your holiday visitors feel extra welcome?

But then I realized that a blog post like that would result in a big fat TO DO list. (Is there a trash can in there? I should get a docking station. We need little travel-sized toothpastes and shampoos…and I should shove my out-of-season clothes aside to make some hanging space…)

That’s the humane society’s mugshot that made me fall in love with him. Frankly, I don’t know how they got him to sit still long enough to take it. My pictures end up looking like this:

In our relentless pursuit of gender neutrality, we’ve decided we can call him a Bossette, which brings our grand total to four.

My husband John and I knew that we wanted a dog in theory, but we know they’re a ton of work: a dog is another kid, really. And we wanted to do it right. Training, crating…all that time-consuming stuff that wasn’t invented when we grew up ;) We just didn’t know if this was the right time.

And then, a few weeks ago, one of our daughters stepped up her “We MUST Have a Dog” campaign. She started leaving pictures from her “dog a day” calendar in the most unlikely places.

Taped to the TV. On my lampshade. (That one reads, “Whoever said you can’t buy happiness forgot about little puppies.”)

In the fridge. In a bag of chips. And yes, in my husband’s sock drawer.

And then, the piece de resistance. On John’s pillow, she left a reindeer Christmas tree ornament with a sign around its neck: